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William Dampier Biography

William Dampier Image

DAMPIER, WILLIAM (1652-1715). An English freebooter and explorer. He early went to sea with a party of buccaneers, crossed the Isthmus of Panama in 1679, and embarked on the Pacific with a considerable force in canoes and similar small craft, and captured several Spanish vessels, in which he cruised along the coast of Spanish America, waging war on Spanish subjects. In 1684 he engaged in another buccaneering expedition with Captain Cook, in which he coasted along the shores of Chile, Peru, and Mexico. After Cook's death he sailed with Captain Swan to the East Indies, touching at Australia and stopping six months in the Philippine Islands. In desperation Dampier and the majority of the crew left Swan and 36 others marooned in the islands where they might continue their orgies. In 1688 Dampier was himself marooned at his own request in the Nicobars After great hardships he was again in England in 1691, where in 1697 he published an interesting account of the expedition, entitled A New Voyage Round the World. He was afterward (1699) deputed by the government to conduct a voyage of discovery to the South Seas, during which he explored the west and northwest coasts of Australia and the coasts of New Guinea, New Britain, and New Ireland, giving his name to the Dampier Archipelago and the Dampier Strait. In 1703-07 he made his third, and in 1708-11 his fourth, trip around the world, the last time as pilot of the privateer Duke, which returned with specie and merchandise to the value of nearly £200,000. He also published: A Discourse of Winds (1699); A Vindication of the Voyage to the South Sec in the Ship St. George (1707); Voyages to type Bay of Campeachy (1729).